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on 11 Roots

11 Comments

Timid Cervid sounds like a wonderful idea. Not only would "feely emotional drivel", as you put it, attract a more sophisticated fanbase than most RPG games –– not because there's anything wrong with RPGs, of course, but because they (tend to) be a bit more straightforward and shallow than 'introspective' games –– but it's also a wonderful concept and it can really be inspiring. It sounds like a game that would be well-received by older players (18+, probably) and more 'artsy' types; people who are more likely to look beyond the superficial and try to find meaning in it, even if it ends up just being a 'projection' of sorts of their own feelings. If that makes any sense.
Also, since it's personal to you and you've seemed somewhat miserable lately, maybe it'll work as a form of catharsis? It might be good to express your emotions and experiences through something like this.

Anyway, no matter what you do or choose to work on or whatever, a good part of the fanbase is behind you all the way. And the ones who aren't don't really count, or at least shouldn't count.

I see. It does seem to be something of a chicken-or-egg question though, because I assume these statistics come mostly from mature adults, or at least from late adolescents. If the data for these staistics come from self-evaluations, such as the online MBTI tests, then, if termed an experiment, it is not a fair trial because there are cultural influences at this level; when you are self-aware, you are also aware of the cultural expectations of you. If someone approaches those tests with an idea about how they're supposed to be/think/act/feel, that will contribute to the results; the results will be biased. So it is something of a what-came-first sort of thing, because did the cultural ideas of masculinity and femininity come from the tendency of males to be Thinkers rather than Feelers and vice versa, or did the idea that males are Thinkers rather than Feelers arise from the fact that emotions (other than aggression or lust and suchlike) are derided 'unmasculine' (or 'girly', if you will) and 'gay'?

But you are right in that there are certainly hormonal influences that contribute to these. Men do have a *relative* tendency towards aggression due to having higher levels of testosterone, and women are seen as 'clingier' and form more openly affectionate bonds because the female body releases more oxytocin than the male body. So there* is* that. I'm not sure if that would directly mean that a female thinker is more emotional and caring than a male thinker, though, since there is no conclusive neurological or biochemical link to prove that women are more *prone* to emotions, just more likely to *express* those they do feel.

This is all very interesting though, and thank you for sharing your views, and thank you for that link, too. This has given me something to think about, for sure.

Exactly for your first part. I would say that this is a major chicken versus egg situation, and I believe research on the matter has been leaning more towards society being the culprit of these inclinations rather than biology, which is why you're seeing more and more school books use minority language and the like.

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It's also interesting to note, I think, that most acts of aggression by males tend to be because of emotional responses. Fear of them or their loved ones being hurt, jealously over their loved one possibly being stolen away, anger over an insult, etc.

Also, about the Oxytocin... There was a study preformed at Lafayette College. pairs of students kissed for 15 minutes while listening to music. The study found that men's oxytocin levels increased while the women's oxytocin levels decreased.
Also, Oxytocin has been linked to "tribal behavior." That is to say the tendency to form cliques and ostracizing those they consider "outsiders."
One more thing, Oxytocin is a "binding" chemical. It doesn't deal with the expression of emotions, nor how prone a person is to them. It is merely a chemical that helps people form bonds with others. It can, however affect the amount of those expressions, as people are more open to showing emotions (read also as letting their guard down) to a person with whom they've developed a bond. In that way, I can see how women tend to express their emotions more, because they have an easier time forming a bond because of their increased Oxytocin levels, so they tend to find themselves in that "guard down" state more often than men do, because they tend to form more bonds than men do.
It also kind of explains the increased tendency of males to aggressively protect themselves and their loved ones from those than they deem outsiders. As their oxytocin levels are lower than women's, they're usually more wary of outsiders. On top of that, because of their lower levels, the increased Oxytocin production during intimate moments can create an "drug addiction", in which, they feel a greater need to be with a particular person (also read as a greater amount of jealousy), because of the body's tendency to want more of the positive feeling, and are threatened when someone else appears to be attempting to take the person they've grown attached to. It also explains why men tend to get over their exes faster as the increased oxytocin happens with the next kiss and the subconcious realizes that others can create the "drugged" effect.

It very well could be a combination of society as well as chemical influences. The societal influence can be the male friends telling a male person to get over their interest, which is caused by a chemical influence, because they haven't had time to form the necessary bond, so they're not as invested in the connection that the person has with their love interest.

If you don't mind me butting on on your conversation (sorry!), can I just say that I find it interesting how these concepts of Thinking and Feeling are (subconsciously) gendered? Because it is interesting, and I think your use of pronouns here illustrates that quite well. I don't think that more females are Feely than Thinky; it's just that a lot of the Thinky traits are subconsciously associated with masculinity. The lack of emotional entanglement, the more direct response, the penchant for "objectively, X is better than Y, so even if you like Y better, you should do X because X has less drawbacks" as opposed to empathy, openly experiencing emotions and making judgements based on emotions, in the sense of, "but I like Y better than X so I'll do that" are a classic divide between what is 'acceptably' masculine and 'acceptably' feminine. Thinky traits are associated with masculinity – directness is often perceived as some form of forerunner to aggression, which is seen as a *good* masculine trait for some reason; it isn't socially acceptable for men to really get emotional, as such. – but Feely traits are traditionally associated with femininity.

It doesn't mean that there's a majority of people of those genders and/or sexes who conform to these general behavioural patterns though, it's just that, culturally, men are *supposed* to project a Thinky image rather than a Feely one; women are *supposed* to be more emotional and thus, more Feely; an aggressive, direct woman is 'unfeminine' and undesireable, so women are less encouraged to show Thinky traits. It's a subconscious thing, I think. (Interestingly, it may have something to do with why Thinking traits are perceived as more mature than Feeling traits, but that's neither here nor there.)

So, yes. I'm sorry for hijacking your conversation and I hope you don't see this as me being preachy about ~les wimmins~ because, well, it's not. Or I never meant it to be, at least. These are just my observations, but, of course, if there are actual studies that show women are more likely to be Feelers based on [brain chemistry quirk], then I'd be very interested in hearing about it. Actually, I'd be very interested in hearing you views on this?

There are loads of different statistics about the prevalence of each type out there, and they tend not to give exactly the same values, but they all generally show about a 2/3 lean towards Thinking for males, and the same lean towards feeling for females.

The most common type for men is supposedly ESTJ, according to that, at least, and the most common for women is ESFJ... (Annoying that it seems that indeed most people are extroverts who are not particularly open to unfamiliar concepts...)INFJ is the rarest type for males, apparently (and I certainly can attest to that from a life of knowing only males and feeling like I was different from them all...), and INTJ is the rarest for females! Interesting, that...

I think that the stereotypical ideas of masculinity and femininity arose from this. Since most men are thinky, and as such possess certain traits as a result of that, moreso than women, that affected how they 'typically' are seen to be (because in the majority of cases, it's accurate), and vice versa...

I've also read though that the T/F thing is weighed differently based on gender on certain MBTI tests, likely because of the results that testosterone and oestrogen have and so on and so forth. So a female thinker is probably maybe perhaps generally more caring and emotional and stuff than a male thinker, just because of her biological role. Probably. Maybe.

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I see. It does seem to be something of a chicken-or-egg question though, because I assume these statistics come mostly from mature adults, or at least from late adolescents. If the data for these staistics come from self-evaluations, such as the online MBTI tests, then, if termed an experiment, it is not a fair trial because there are cultural influences at this level; when you are self-aware, you are also aware of the cultural expectations of you. If someone approaches those tests with an idea about how they're supposed to be/think/act/feel, that will contribute to the results; the results will be biased. So it is something of a what-came-first sort of thing, because did the cultural ideas of masculinity and femininity come from the tendency of males to be Thinkers rather than Feelers and vice versa, or did the idea that males are Thinkers rather than Feelers arise from the fact that emotions (other than aggression or lust and suchlike) are derided 'unmasculine' (or 'girly', if you will) and 'gay'?

But you are right in that there are certainly hormonal influences that contribute to these. Men do have a *relative* tendency towards aggression due to having higher levels of testosterone, and women are seen as 'clingier' and form more openly affectionate bonds because the female body releases more oxytocin than the male body. So there* is* that. I'm not sure if that would directly mean that a female thinker is more emotional and caring than a male thinker, though, since there is no conclusive neurological or biochemical link to prove that women are more *prone* to emotions, just more likely to *express* those they do feel.

This is all very interesting though, and thank you for sharing your views, and thank you for that link, too. This has given me something to think about, for sure.

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Exactly for your first part. I would say that this is a major chicken versus egg situation, and I believe research on the matter has been leaning more towards society being the culprit of these inclinations rather than biology, which is why you're seeing more and more school books use minority language and the like.

0

♥

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It's also interesting to note, I think, that most acts of aggression by males tend to be because of emotional responses. Fear of them or their loved ones being hurt, jealously over their loved one possibly being stolen away, anger over an insult, etc.

Also, about the Oxytocin... There was a study preformed at Lafayette College. pairs of students kissed for 15 minutes while listening to music. The study found that men's oxytocin levels increased while the women's oxytocin levels decreased.
Also, Oxytocin has been linked to "tribal behavior." That is to say the tendency to form cliques and ostracizing those they consider "outsiders."
One more thing, Oxytocin is a "binding" chemical. It doesn't deal with the expression of emotions, nor how prone a person is to them. It is merely a chemical that helps people form bonds with others. It can, however affect the amount of those expressions, as people are more open to showing emotions (read also as letting their guard down) to a person with whom they've developed a bond. In that way, I can see how women tend to express their emotions more, because they have an easier time forming a bond because of their increased Oxytocin levels, so they tend to find themselves in that "guard down" state more often than men do, because they tend to form more bonds than men do.
It also kind of explains the increased tendency of males to aggressively protect themselves and their loved ones from those than they deem outsiders. As their oxytocin levels are lower than women's, they're usually more wary of outsiders. On top of that, because of their lower levels, the increased Oxytocin production during intimate moments can create an "drug addiction", in which, they feel a greater need to be with a particular person (also read as a greater amount of jealousy), because of the body's tendency to want more of the positive feeling, and are threatened when someone else appears to be attempting to take the person they've grown attached to. It also explains why men tend to get over their exes faster as the increased oxytocin happens with the next kiss and the subconcious realizes that others can create the "drugged" effect.

It very well could be a combination of society as well as chemical influences. The societal influence can be the male friends telling a male person to get over their interest, which is caused by a chemical influence, because they haven't had time to form the necessary bond, so they're not as invested in the connection that the person has with their love interest.

The animated Miasmon sprites look quite fancy, very much like the kind of quality you'd expect from a game you'd have to *buy* to play (or, uh, pirate, I suppose) like Pokémon.
Also, they are adorable. The animations are nice and smooth and 'natural', which is good, but even if you decide to drop the vectors, the pixel sprites have their retro charms too. So there is that.

I'll skip the unhelpful and unsolicitated advice, since I am rather useless at flash, and just wish you luck on your projects. So good luck!

It's good that you're regaining interest in art, because you appear to be very good at it! Frankly, I doubt anyone would complain about game development going, as they say, on the back-burner for some time as you focus on your art; these pieces are genuinely impressive, and the fact that it only takes you about an hour to draw them is… actually making me rather jealous, as I have to pour a lot of time into making anything look good, whereas these are… well, looking very good. And are made at a fraction of the time I'd have to dedicate to making something of this standard. You're a brilliant artist, I think, so keep it up! I love the viscious snarl of the first wolf (it looks ready to tear my throat out with its teeth), but it's the second one that gets to me most. Those are the blank white eyes of a killer, I'd say.
So, yeah. In short, you're a brilliant artist and if focusing on your art makes you feel happier than games do at the moment, by all means, focus on your art. You're very good at it.

By the way, just out of curiosity, how's the art course you mentioned in an earlier post working out for you?

Honestly, I doubt this *only* applies to teenagers. I remember looking back on when I was thirteen and thinking (now) that I was a naïve, arrogant little brat. I'm sure that when I'm eighteen, I'll look back on myself now and think the exact same thing. When I'm twenty-four, I'll think my eighteen-year-old self was a twat. And so on and so forth. Nobody's happy with who they were when they were younger.

But yes. Recognising this isn't the same as not being guilty of it; I have intense disdain for most of my peers because I consider them childish. (To be fair though, they sing Disney songs, out loud, in public, in the middle of they day while biking, which is really rather silly and also rude since they really can't sing at all.) Likewise, I'm sure they consider me childish or stupid or whatever, because we all seem to think we're so much better than everyone else nowadays. It seems like either everyone wants to be some 'cool', 'mature' person, wants to be an 'adult' or they cling to childhood because 'omg guys growing up sucks!'

I've been hearing about the Myers-Briggs thing, but since everything I saw was just four-letter acronyms I couldn't understand that apparently just had people keysmashing over ot liking their type, I never gave it much thought. Also, because I appear to be vaguely hipster about these things, or possibly lazy. I did take the test you linked to here and I am, if that is to be trusted, an 'INTP'. Moderately introverted, distinctly intuitive, distinctly thinking, with a slight penchant for perception rather than judging.

That… seems reasonable? Actually, after reading the second linked-to site, I honestly sort of agree with this profile. I mean, parts of it is completely ridiculous, but parts have me going, 'hey, this is familiar! …wait, do others really perceive me as brash?' I've had less accurate test results before, I suppose, but it's not *completely* me. None of them really are, which I guess is sort of the thing about personality types; they only describe a general trend over an absolute.

The thing I don't like about the test, is that there's no in-between. You are either this way or that way, facets be damned. That's not a good thing though, because sometimes, I'll feel like staying home and not go to a party. Sometimes, I'll go. Sometimes I'll go to a club alone just to dance because I can do that and I don't have to talk to anyone if I don't want to. Of course, I guess you're meant to answer what you do 'most times' but that can be very hard to gauge. It's hard to be objective about yourself because everyone has this image of themselves that they want to live up to, and we answer these tests with an inherent kind of bias. I *want* others to see me as unemotional, and I see myself as mostly unemotional, but I'm aware of the fact that I do get emotionally invested in the weirdest things - not to the degree of living myself into something and crying at a movie or something, but if a series I've been following for a long time ends sadly, I feel… disappointed. Something that I wanted to see happen didn't, or a favourite character dies and I do respond with vague disappointment. I know others who react far more, however, so there is a strong indication that my emotions don't run as deep, in that sense, and that I'm crap at expressing them anyways, so it doesn't matter as much. But I think of myself as relatively distant, and that's not entirely inaccurate, so I answer the relevant questions in that way. That doesn't make me as cold and distant as the profile of an INTP stereotypes INTPs as, because I can still feel depressed and overwhelmed and stressed and sometimes I break down and cry. But I don't broadcast it and I don't expect sympathy. Similarly, because upon rereading, the above paragraph is really sort of pathetic an depressing, the smallest, silliest things can make me ridiculously happy, and I reserve a special love for all thing either horrifying or horrifyingly twee. I just don't show it in public, 'cause that's bad form, you see.

The point I am trying to make, in a ridiculously roundabout way, is that these tests *cannot* be 100% accurate in the first place and by making people answer in absolutes, rather than giving a spectrum of answers, they're just aggrandising the problem. My profile mostly fits, because I'm either really easy to type or I just don't care enough to find more stuff to disagree with, but most of it seems like a bunch of lucky guesses that might describe someone just extreme enough to one end that people can just pick out traits to agree with and let that be that. And you can see this in the amount of people poking flaws in this and disagreeing with their typing. That's sort of why I disagree with personality typing in the first place; it's not that people can't be labled, it's just too much bother trying to be objective about these things when lableing people. The only way to get a 'proper' 100% correct typing would be to have someone completely unbiased type you through observation, but then comes the emotional attachments and penchant for notcing one trait above the other due to personal bias. And, if they don't know you, there's no way to type you since a good part of people's personalities is not really expressed in public.
So, yeah. That's what I think anyway.

I'd consider myself introverted, to be honest. It's not that I have problems talking to people, or that I'm not able to function socially, which is what I see a lot of people talking about here, but rather that I don't actively seek social interaction. Of course, that's not something that makes me introverted in itself - I don't like people, but not because I'm introverted; I don't like people because I really just don't like people, which, in turn, manifests in behaviour that reaffirms my, uh, *natural* introversion or something silly-sounding like that. I don't seek social interaction and I genuinely enjoy being alone; I don't have this longing for other relationships others seem to have, which is odd. I can function perfectly well in society, even if small talk isn't really my forte, but as long as I share some interests with someone or have some sort of basis with them, I'm perfectly capable of communicating with them - it's just that I don't really want to. Honestly, I really don't care about others most of the time.

These aren't traits exclusive to me - I know my brother feels the same way, because these things tend to come up in discussion sometimes. I guess maybe it has something to do with how we were raised, or something? Most of the relationships in my life, friendship or otherwise, have been fleeting, because we move every two years or something to a new country, so there's that. But I also think that there's an innate, personal aspect to this too, not just a reaction to the environment in which I was raised.

I really do wonder if other introverts - if I can really call myself introvert; from the comments, it seems that most are just shy and want to make contact with others, rather than actively *not seeking* relationships - feel the same way as me sometimes, where I'm really just scornful of other, more extroverted people. Maybe I'm just a very negative person sometimes - it tends to fluctuate - but people who'd rather socialise *in class* or during important events tend to annoy me, and when they get negative results, I feel oddly vindicated. It's not nice of me, but I guess I'm just not a very nice person sometimes. Furthermore, I'm not nearly as introverted when I'm with people I actually like; I don't mind sharing my thoughts and opinions when prompted and when I'm with people I like, we all want to hear each others thoughts anyways, so… Well, I guess I'm maybe not a true introvert, in that sense.

My, that *is* a rather wonderful coincidence. Although I wasn't born in the Netherlands, but I'm just living here… Uh, oddly enough, I, too, know a Dutch Sophie with grey eyes (our names get confused very often; it's a little irritating, actually), which is yet another contrived coincidence! I have no idea why I'm bringing this up, but, uh, well, coincidences. And such.

Thank you very much for your kind words; it's very sweet of you and I really appreciate it. I think this is possibly the first time I've ever been welcomed by something other than an automated email, actually, and I don't actually just automatically delete this comment upon seeing it! And I'm rambling right now, so thank you very much for your kind words.

I write, both for my own enjoyment and (occasionally) for a small, local magazine. It's not a *job* in the traditional sense, but the fact remains that I do write, often fiction but also columns or small articles, and I'm quite proud of the fact. Of course, this is just what *others* read - things that get published, things that I put online, archived stuff on Fictionpress or DeviantArt, etc. That doesn't change the fact that I've got several, often quite *good*, pieces of writing just stored away on my laptop, not actually published or shown others or anything. Sometimes, I'll go ahead and read over those pieces, edit them a bit more, re-organise the sequence of events if necessary… basically, just edit them. And that is probably my favourite part; I can churn out a 2k words in an hour and call it a story/column/article/editorial/whathaveyou, but the fact remains that it's usually not something I'm *proud* of at that moment. It's like drawing; you can sketch the outline of your main subject matter, but the picture is still not finished. Similarly, without editing and whatnot, you have just *written* something. You haven't *created* anything.
Looking back on my past work, I generally cringe, because, in retrospect, I find my views or the storyline wonderfully naïve and hardly appropriate at all; the dialogue feels unnatural or childish or stilted, and the prose has a definite puerile bent - or, worse yet, sounds remarkably pretentious. (I still have a talent for verbosity, even now, but this is *toned down* compared to how I used to sound. Which, uh… says a lot, actually.)
I think what I'm trying to say here is that there's a lot that has never seen the light of day when it comes to my writing. And that's absolutely fine, because when I write, it's not just because I want others to know my name or because my views are so ~special and ~enlightened, because they're not. I'm a fifteen-year-old living a rather priveledged life, of course they're nothing special. But I enjoy writing and I enjoy editing and looking back on my work is sort of bittersweet, in a way, because some of it is hilariously bad and some of it is actually pretty okay. My main fulfillment comes from the fact that I can look at my own things, set apart from what I've gotten published/have self-published via dA/Fictionpress/whatever and think, 'hey, maybe this wasn't such a bad idea after all' or 'I've improved since this, thank god' or even 'ahaha, this reminds me of that one time that I can't really remember the details of but probably involved me doing something stupid with a friend of mine that could've gone horribly wrong but didn't and is actually pretty funny in retrospect'. As long as you derive pleasure from it in any way, even if it's just from small details in works you're otherwise unhappy with, then I think it's totally worth it. But I might be odd in that respect, who knows?